


Where the Ice Crushes the Wave

by kitkat1003



Category: LEGO Monkie Kid
Genre: Abuse, Blood and Gore, Dubious Consent, Emotional Manipulation, Hurt No Comfort, Minor Character Death, Other, Possession, This is a very messed up fic, like i went ham to make it very dark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-15 14:01:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29560188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kitkat1003/pseuds/kitkat1003
Summary: I don't know if you've heard of Possessed Tang, but it's everywhere on tumblr, and it's basically an excuse to hurt Pigsy.  I decided to go ham.The warnings I put are real.  Viewer Discretion is advised.
Relationships: Tang/pigsy, freenoodleshipping
Comments: 6
Kudos: 16





	Where the Ice Crushes the Wave

Pigsy notices something is wrong immediately.

It’s not hard. He’s been watching Tang for years, knows him like the back of his hand. He knows that Tang is always there when he opens, at least for a few minutes. They’ll banter, then Tang will disappear for a few hours before arriving at lunch to steal some noodles. At some point, Pigsy will yell, chase him out but not really, and Tang will laugh all the while.

On a good day, Pigsy will invite Tang upstairs, and they eat dinner in Pigsy’s apartment. They’ll sit in front of the TV for hours, making fun of idiots in cooking shows, and Pigsy will deliberate over and over on the idea of moving his hand to hold Tang’s. He never does, because he’s afraid to push, afraid to ask for too much and lose what he already has. 

Pigsy can feel the power he has, vibrating in his skin, hidden because the person he used to be is not who he wants to be now, ever. He knows that if he let that loose, if he grew tall and strong and dangerous, everyone around him would suffer; he holds it all in.

He just waits for Tang. He can be patient. He has spent a thousand years learning to be, and he thanks his master for teaching him, because if he was to wait for anything it would be this.

He’d spend an eternity and a day waiting for that.

For four days, though, Tang doesn’t come to the shop at all.

Pigsy texts him, calls him, and gets nothing. He shouts more, is biting and sharp for those four days, wracked with worry and desperate for answers.

He searches even the town once. Twice. He waits, because that’s what he’s good at, but at the same time he wants to grow large and take charge, to roar into the night and shake the world until it tells him where his Tang is.

Four days of waiting before Tang appears in the shop in the morning. He smiles and waves, as if he hadn’t blown Pigsy off for four days, as if he hadn’t worried Pigsy sick.

“Where the hell have you been?!” Pigsy grabs Tang by his scarf and pulls, too angry and worried and hurt to stop himself.

Tang starts but gives him an easygoing smile in return. That’s what tips Pigsy off first. The curve of the lips is wrong, more cunning than kind.

“Sorry-family emergency.” Easy deflection. Tang shrugs. “I kept meaning to text you back, but stuff kept coming up.”

Pigsy could almost accept that, except Tang has never brought up his family before. To talk about them now, it seems too...convenient. And regardless of that, Tang has never left Pigsy in the lurch like this. It’s too out of character. A quick text to say ‘I’m okay’ would take but a minute. Tang is kind enough to give Pigsy a  _ minute _ of his time, he wouldn’t just let Pigsy sit worried _. _

Right?

He stares at Tang, squinting a little, and almost lets him go. But then.

“You changed your glasses,” he notes.

The rims are blue. He can see traces of snowflakes on the lenses.

Tang smiles, eyes shut and head tilted to one side. Pigsy is suddenly aware of something dangerous, sitting beneath his friend’s skin. The hairs on his arm stand up straight, and it is so, so obvious now that this isn’t Tang at all.

“Yes,” Not Tang says, and his smile is all teeth. “Do you like them?”

Pigsy knows a challenge when he sees one, and he takes a breath.

“Prefer your old ones, actually,” he grunts out. “Blue isn’t your color.”

Not Tang laughs. It sends a shiver down Pigsy’s spine. But it isn’t just fear, no, his cheeks color.

“On that, Pigsy, we will have to disagree.” His name out of Not Tang’s mouth sounds foreign, but it’s Tang’s voice, and Not Tang curls something soft and sweet around Pigsy’s name like it knows.

Pigsy goes to work, and firmly refuses to look over his shoulder.

He can feel Not Tang’s eyes on him anyway.

MK doesn’t notice anything wrong with Tang. Mei doesn’t either. Not Tang tells MK a story, talks animatedly with Mei about her next race and promises to be there. Pigsy makes a bowl of noodles on autopilot and hands it to Not Tang. Not Tang holds the chopsticks differently. Not Tang doesn’t slurp up the noodles and fails to give Pigsy a smirk when he finishes the bowl, like Tang would have.

Pigsy is tense the whole day, and he waits until MK heads upstairs and the shop is closed to do anything.

“Can I walk you home? Figure we should talk. Haven’t seen ya in four days,” he jerks a thumb towards the door. Not Tang tilts his head to the side, and his glasses flash in a way that is so familiar, and yet makes Pigsy shiver again.

“Sure. I missed you.” And Pigsy is taken aback, because it sounds like Not Tang means it. Maybe he—no, he knows this isn’t Tang.

But how much is it  _ not _ Tang?

They walk out of the store, and down a block or two. Pigsy doesn’t know where Tang lives, though he suspects somewhere near the library, but Not Tang is following his lead. Looks like Not Tang doesn’t know, either.

He grabs Not Tang by the scarf, and drags him into an alley. He slams Not Tang against the wall, hard but not too hard because Not Tang is still Tang’s body. Tang is still mortal.

“I don’t know who the  _ hell _ you are,” he starts, and he lets his tusks out, baring his sharp teeth like a challenge, a growl in his throat. His eyes glow ocean blue, his nostrils flare. “But you better get the  _ fuck _ out of my friend or—”

The words die in his throat as Not Tang laughs, cold and dark, and as he looks up and sees his own gaze met with something sharp and blue and icy.

“Or what, Bajie?” 

His voice has an undercurrent of something familiar, another voice Pigsy recognizes. He wracks his brain.

“What, don’t recognize me? Not surprising, when only one of your troupe ever could.”

That has Pigsy stumbling back, because he knows, now, he knows what that means. It’s a stain on his pride, one of his many regrets, it’s—

“Baigujing,” he breathes, and she laughs.

“In the flesh, so to speak. Does he suit me?” she asks, tugging on Tang’s skin and hair like one might with clothes.

She frowns, tilts his head to the side at an unnatural angle. “I’m not a fan of red,” she tells him. Then Tang changes _,_ hair black to white from the roots. It travels down, red to blue, silver to gold. His skin gains a blue tint, as well. The air around them drops in temperature, and Pigsy can see his breath.

She brushes herself off, takes a little bow, and all Pigsy can see is Tang who isn’t—this isn’t—how did she—

She takes a confident step forward, and Pigsy, in all his rage, still only sees blue.

“You get out of him  _ right now _ , or—”

In a flash, she pulls out a knife and presses it against Tang’s throat. Pigsy sees a few spots of red from where she’s pressing the blade, and cool terror sinks down his spine. She wouldn’t, would she? He can’t be sure, with how she’s wielding the weapon like a promise. He takes a step forward out of panic, and stops when she raises a brow. 

“You do anything but what I say, and I stain this new outfit.” She smiles, and it’s Tang’s smile, the one that Pigsy melts under the sight of every time. 

But here, now, he’s ice. Fear roots him to the spot and Pigsy swallows the lump in his throat.

“And if I tell the others about ya when you aren’t looking at me?” he grinds out between gritted teeth.

She tilts her head to the side. “Why would they believe you? After all, you wouldn’t believe your own brother,” Pigsy flinches, remembering how easy it was to get Triptaka to banish Wukong, because Bajie never would pass up an opportunity to call his brother a liar, to hurt him. “Turnabout’s fair play, and you’re on the losing side.”

Pigsy clenches his fists. He can feel the desire to get big, to roar, to tear her out of him, rise in his chest. But this can’t be solved with violence, as easy as he wants it to be. Pigsy has never been good at diplomacy.

“What do you want,” he spits out.

She brushes Tang’s hair out of her eyes. They glow in the evening light, bright and malicious.

“I have a few errands, and while this mortal is useful, he is a bit...weak.” She flexes Tang’s fingers experimentally. “You’re quite the muscle. I think you’d be quite useful, hmm?”

Pigsy does know a challenge when he sees one, but this time, he’s backed into a corner, with no way out, so he slumps his shoulders.

“Alright. Just….just don’t hurt him.” It comes out a tired plea. “And stop-don’t ruin him like that.” He gestures to her getup. He’s sure she’s only showing him this to hurt him, because he wants Tang. Not whatever this abomination is. Just practically, it would give her away if she didn’t change back. Though he’s not sure how much of a choice he gets, regardless. 

She sighs, but after a moment the pleasant red and gold return, and Tang’s hair is black again.

“Fine. Picky, though,” she places Tang’s hand on his cheek, cupping the side of his face, and Pigsy’s cheeks warm. When he looks up, everything about Tang looks normal, except the blue rims on the glasses. He looks away.

“Tomorrow,” he tells her. “We’ll start tomorrow. And once-once I’m done, you’re out of him, got it?” 

He glares, and she smiles, Tang’s mouth curving into something more unhinged. Brown eyes glow light blue.

“It’s a date.”

* * *

Tang doesn’t remember the few days that he disappears. He doesn’t even remember disappearing, to be honest. He just walks to the noodle shop as if nothing is wrong, because to him, nothing is. 

He can tell that something  _ off _ , though. Not wrong, but off, because when he walks the feeling of his feet against the ground is muted. Everything is a little muted, like all of his senses are muffled by something. He shakes his head a few times, to try and break through the fog. It doesn’t work.

He waves at Pigsy when he walks in, and then nearly jumps when he’s grabbed. He tries to open his mouth to say something, but suddenly everything goes cold, and he’s pushed back into his own head. Someone else takes the reins, Something Else moves his lips.

Family emergency, he hears himself say. He sees the reflection of himself in Pigsy’s eyes. His glasses are different. Pigsy notices.

He watches the Something Else make Pigsy very aware that the  _ Something Else _ exists, and then he is thrown into the passenger’s seat. When MK comes over to ask for a story, Tang is allowed to tell him one. When Mei talks about her next race, Tang can avidly respond.

He keeps trying to explain that something’s wrong, to them, but when he opens his mouth to try and say the words nothing comes out, or the Something Else will say something. A joke, or a fact, or nothing at all, and doesn’t silence sometimes speak the loudest. 

It knows too much about him and the longer he knows it’s in his head, the more he can feel it, cool tendrils poking into memories he’d rather have private. It searches, it pries, and it leaves no stone left unturned, leaving Tang feeling vulnerable, invaded.

The day ends. Pigsy asks to walk him home and Tang finds himself agreeing before he can stop himself, before  _ it _ can. He wonders if it even tried.

They walk, and it’s only a matter of time before Pigsy snaps. Tang is honestly surprised it hasn’t happened sooner, when he’s unceremoniously thrown against the wall. It hurts, but much like his other senses, the pain is muted. He knows Pigsy isn’t using his full strength though. Pigsy can throw people five times his size out the door with ease.

He follows the conversation with bated breath, and then he sees something like recognition flicker in Pigsy’s eyes, and he hears Baigujing, and it says  _ Bajie _ , and—

Oh.

There’s a knife to his throat. 

He sees his reflection in Pigsy’s wide eyes. His hair is white. His eyes are a startling, glowing blue, and he can feel blood welling up where the knife pierces his skin.

Pigsy buckles. Tang watches him leave.

“What do you want?” he asks, to the Something Else.

He gets farther and farther away from control with each step she takes in his skin, every moment he isn’t allowed to speak. He can feel cool shackles on his wrists, thick as steel.

“You like him very much, don’t you?” A voice, chilling and cruel, rings in his ears. Tang doesn’t need her to specify who she’s referencing. They pass by a window, a storefront. She stops, and turns to it, so Tang can see her smile with his mouth in the reflection.

Tang’s blood turns to ice, and he wonders if it’s because she’s the one in his body or if it’s just his fear, in the end. She grins wider, and Tang’s helplessness and terror grow.

“I am going to break him, and you are going to watch.”

* * *

The next day Pigsy is quiet. He doesn’t say much besides telling MK to take out the orders placed on the counter. His eyes occasionally flick to her, to Tang, to the thing sitting on the counter that looks familiar in looks alone.

Pigsy knows he has to remember. He can’t forget that this isn’t Tang. Even when he sees her sitting on the same barstool with that same smile, when she learns how Tang holds his chopsticks and learns how Tang eats, even when she is already perfecting something that everyone else sees is perfect.

This isn’t Tang. Pigsy can’t forget that.

That night, she gestures for Pigsy to follow her. He does, walking step by step with her, waiting for her to tell him what to do. She takes him toward the marketplace, where Pigsy goes to get his ingredients a few times a month.

“You remember that Spider Queen, don’t you? Quite the adventure we had,” she says, and Pigsy bristles at the implication.

“You weren’t there,” he growls out. 

She places a hand on Tang’s chest, expression one of mock offense. “How could I not have been? I mean, you were there with me. Is this not the skin?” she tugs on the fleshy part of Tang’s wrist, hard enough that the skin goes red. 

Pigsy says nothing, and shrugs. 

“Regardless, the Spider Queen will get in my way if she isn’t handled, so you’ll take care of her. Better to squash a bug before it grows.” She points to the Spider Queen’s stall.

“I don’t kill anymore,” Pigsy grunts.

He hasn’t for years. He took that part of himself and locked it away, made himself small because he wanted people to feel safe around him without being scared of what he could do. He doesn’t kill. He makes people food, he doesn’t harm them more than any other mortal could.

The knife is back out, and Pigsy knows where she’ll imply it going.

“I do,” she purrs. “And you’re mine, so you do too.”

Pigsy clenches his fists, and shifts.

He’d imagined showing Tang his demon form. Imagined preparing for months, carefully explaining. Imagined going someplace remote, someplace theirs, and revealing himself. Imagined scenarios where Tang ran, imagined scenarios where Tang stayed.

He grows tall, and burly, and looming and powerful. He’s about eight feet tall, here, with the muscles to match the height. His rake appears in his hand, prongs sharp. It’s as tall as he is, and the prongs are longer than his forearm. She looks up at him with an impressed expression that looks wrong on Tang’s face, yet makes Pigsy’s cheeks burn anyway.

“Magnificent,” she breathes, and he shivers at the sound.

He holds his rake tight, setting it on his shoulder and glancing over to the stall. He tries to stop his hands from shaking, as she leads him to the entrance.

“Give me a lift, won’t you dear?” she asks and Pigsy grits his teeth.

He lifts Tang up, gentle with his body because even if Tang isn’t the one asking Pigsy will be damned if he hurts him like this, and they descend.

The Spider Queen’s lair is as eerie as he remembers it, though it seems to have been upgraded. There are pods of glowing green liquid everywhere, and a computer as well. He catches what looks like a human bent over it, tapping at keys and sighing to himself.

“Is it done yet? The world needs its Queen to return.” He hears her voice from the right, and shifts a little to hide as she comes in. The man at the computer stiffens, and turns around at perfect attention, bowing.

“U-Unfortunately, such a complex undertaking is going to take more time, my Queen,” the man trembles out.

“What are you waiting for?” Tang’s voice slithers into his ear, and Pigsy fights back the urge to growl, letting out a huff of a breath and narrowing his eyes in annoyance.

“An opening,” he replies.

“This has to be done by New Years! I want to start the Year of the Spider  _ on time _ ,” she growls the last part out.

“Y-Yes, my Queen,” The scientist replies.

She turns away, and that’s when Pigsy jumps down. She just barely dodges his rake and Tang jumps off of his shoulder to settle in the shadows. Fine. Now Pigsy doesn’t have to worry about him getting caught in the crossfire.

The Spider Queen recovers quickly, getting into a battle stance. She gives him a once over, and then smirks.

“So the pig is back to fight, hmm? I would have liked to see you in this form last time,” She purrs out the words, chuckling to herself.

Pigsy charges without response. He swings his rake, she ducks, throwing out a sharp leg. He blocks with his arm and grunts when the blade edge of her leg digs in. He lifts a leg and kicks her, no holds barred where her humanesque body and her spider body meet. A weak point.

She lets out a shout of rage as she’s knocked back. He slices to the right, knocking off her helmet. Long, messy black hair tumbles down in front of her face. She pushes it back, darts forward, throwing out some webs.

He dodges the first few, but one catches him by the foot, trapping him to the floor. He twists and dodges as best he can when he can’t move, but she’s closing in.

He throws out the rake, in a last ditch attempt as she goes in for the killing blow, and catches her neck between two of the prongs, following through with the swing, bringing her crashing down onto her side.

“Fool!” she grits out, twisting her legs to try and stand. “I am the Queen of this world! I will feed you to my subjects, you—”

Pigsy twists the rake in one sharp motion.

_ Crack. _

She goes very silent, and very still. Pigsy breathes, as her body slumps down on itself.

Okay. 

Pigsy slowly, carefully, pulls away the rake. 

He waits for movement. He finds none.

Okay.

“Do try and make sure she stays dead.”

He jumps at the sound, turning around to see Tang.

Tang is watching. Tang. Tang watched—

Not Tang. He has to remember that.

Her eyes glitter in the low light.

“A broken neck can be fixed. Make sure she can’t come back. Wouldn’t want to have to deal with a vengeful Queen, right?” She gestures to the corpse.

Pigsy grips his rake tightly.

The prongs go through flesh far too easily.

He thinks they’re about done, but then she points to the computer. More specifically, to the man cowering beneath the control panel of the computer.

“No witnesses,” she says. “Get rid of him.”

Pigsy is frozen in his spot.

“Please,” the man begs. “I didn’t want to help, I had no choice! She was going to kill me-I-I’ll destroy everything I did! I’ll delete the code. Everything!”

“You misunderstand.” Tang-she-walks carefully towards the cowering mortal. “We didn’t do this to save the world. We did this to get her  _ out of my way. _ ”

Dawning horror flashes on the man’s face.

Pigsy hesitates. A demon is one thing, this is just a mortal. A human. Pigsy glances at the man, and imagines her pointing him at MK. Or Mei. He couldn’t. He can’t.

“Would you rather I do this?” She pulls out the knife, pointing it at the man. “I know you prefer him in red, though I hear blood is difficult to get off clothes.”

At the thought of Tang, who could be still in there, having to watch himself kill, Pigsy moves.

The man hedges his bets and runs. He ducks under the knife and Pigsy’s outstretched arm, sprints toward the exit, but Pigsy’s arm swings around after him. He can’t take more than a step forward because his foot is still stuck by the webs, but his legs are long and his arms much the same. He reaches over in a panic, and grabs the man by the head, aiming to muffle his shouting, stop him from doing anything while Pigsy tries to negotiate, when—

There’s a sickening crunch, and squelch, and the man goes limp.

Pigsy is very, very aware of the liquid dripping from between the spaces of his fingers. He’s afraid to open his hand.

She claps, then is at his side, cutting him free of the webs.

“Good work.” She pats him on the side.

Pigsy trembles. Slowly, he opens his hand.

All of his body falls but the head. The  _ head. _

Pieces drop, clattering or squishing or dripping. Pigsy’s hand is covered in it. Hair clings to his fingers. Skin folds in on itself on the ground, with nothing solid to hold it taut.

Pigsy feels like he’s going to be sick. He didn’t mean….he hasn’t taken this form in years, decades, he isn’t used to the power it holds. He didn’t mean to, he was panicked, he just, he needed the man to stop. That was it, it wasn’t on purpose, he didn’t mean—

“Feels good,” she whispers in his ear, somehow. “Doesn’t it?”

Pigsy stumbles away, trying to shake the pieces, the blood, the  _ person  _ off of his hand. He trips over the Spider Queen’s body and crashes into the computer, destroying it. His knees pull toward his chest as he tries to breathe. 

It takes a good minute for him to realize that she’s rubbing a hand up and down his back in a comforting manner. He looks down at her, because even sitting he’s taller, and her smile is—that’s not hers. 

“Tang?” his voice is hoarse. His tusks always get in the way of speaking.

Tang smiles. It’s soft, pitying, almost sympathetic.

Pigsy feels himself melt, a little. It’s almost familiar.

“It’s okay,” Tang says, but is it him? Pigsy doesn’t know if he wants it to be. A part of him craves the comfort of something familiar, another doesn’t want Tang to see him at his worst, covered in blood, with a body count.

“That’s enough for tonight,” Tang says, she says, Pigsy can’t tell. His head is already trying to process what he’s done. “Let’s go. C’mon.”

Pigsy lets himself be helped up. He lifts Tang onto his shoulder and climbs out of the cave, shivering when the chilly night air whips past him. He still has a few hours before he has to get up for work. He sets Tang down on the ground, shifts back to his smaller form.

Tang looms over him like this. Pigsy regrets becoming small.

“Shall we?” Tang gestures towards Pigsy’s apartment.

Pigsy nods, and they walk home. Once they arrive, Tang heads to the couch, and Pigsy to the bathroom. He scrubs and scrubs at his hands, until the water stops turning pink and then some. His palms burn, skin scraping against skin, but he can see the pieces that can’t fit in the drain.

He vomits, finally, in the toilet. He coughs, wiping his mouth, and hunches over the sink, glancing at himself in the mirror. Deep breaths. He just needs to remember that this will be over, eventually.

“I’m going to bed,” he calls, as he leaves the bathroom. 

His hands are still shaking. His throat burns, and he lets it, maybe as a punishment. He doesn’t know.

“Goodnight!” Comes a voice that sounds too much like the real thing. Pigsy takes in a shuddering breath and vanishes into his bedroom.

He curls underneath the blankets and tries to get the cold feeling to escape his bones. It seems to settle in, regardless.

It takes him a long time to fall asleep.

* * *

Whatever Tang had imagined she’d make Pigsy do, it wasn’t this. He watches as they head to the market, and then as Pigsy changes, per her request.

He wonders if Pigsy would have ever shown him this form otherwise. As is, Tang is terrified, but not of Pigsy. He’s worried  _ for _ Pigsy. Because he knows the power Zhu Bajie can wield. here He knows that she knows, too.

Watching Pigsy fight and kill is as impressive as it is heartbreaking. He can see the shock, the horror, as Pigsy grapples with his actions. Tang can’t fight the revulsion when he sees Pigsy kill the poor bystander but at the same time he can’t hate him for it. 

He could never hate Pigsy foremost, but in this instance, he can’t hold this carnage against him. Not when Pigsy curls in on himself, his bigger form trying to be as small as possible. Not when he won’t look at his own blood-stained hands.

He moves to take a step, stumbles as she throws him the controls. The longer he isn’t allowed to do anything, to speak, to move, the harder it is to get used to doing it when he has control. He wonders if he’ll forget how to walk eventually. He wonders if he’ll forget how to breathe.

He tries to comfort. He’s not allowed to tell Pigsy that it’s him, because she won’t let him, but he can comfort, because she needs Pigsy functioning for this to work. Maybe Tang should be offended that she’s using him, but truthfully, he just wants to do something to help Pigsy. He can’t just stand aside to watch. It’s almost worth being used if he’s used to help.

Pigsy looks at him, then. Tang wants to apologize. To beg for Pigsy to stop. He doesn’t know if Pigsy can recognize that it’s him, either. The words don’t make it to his throat and she throws him into the backseat again.

When they get home, Pigsy stays in the bathroom for too long. Tang hears the sound of retching and winces. He wishes he could do something, say something.

As he falls asleep, he still wishes he could apologize. For something. Anything. Everything.

He can’t feel his legs.

* * *

The next morning, Pigsy gets up and heads to work. Tang is sitting upright on the couch. Pigsy pointedly doesn’t look at him, quick while making breakfast, eating, and grabbing his chef’s coat before heading to the shop. He typically starts two hours before opening, setting up the dough, stringing out noodles.

He’s slow, today. His hands shake as he tries to work, he’s halfway to where he’s supposed to be when MK comes down, on time for once. He forces himself to speed up because he knows calls will be coming in soon.

He sets the broth to boil, stirring once, glancing down at it to check its progress, and—

It’s red.

It’s red and it’s spilling from his fingers, sticky and thick as it falls into the broth, the stench of it has him trembling violently enough that the spoon slips from his fingers. Pieces of hair and bone bubble up from the bottom, and Pigsy sees an empty eye socket, staring at him in terror, pleading horror, begging for mercy.

He grabs the pot and pours it into the sink, he can’t let anyone see it, can’t let anyone know what he’s done, the stains settling deep into his skin with no way out, no way to make it disappear. A man is dead. A man is dead and Pigsy killed him  _ and it’s everywhere and everyone is going to know and he has to get rid of it. _

When he pours it into the drain, there’s not a spot of red in it. He watches his half an hour’s worth of work disappear with an unsteady breath, setting the pot back on the stove and washing his hands. The water boils his fingers.

“Uh...Pigsy?” MK calls. 

Pigsy turns and does not look in the direction where he knows Tang will be. He catches MK’s expression, brow is pinched in concern.

“What?” He doesn’t mean to growl the words out as he does.

“Um, why’d you do that? It looked almost ready,” MK points to the now empty pot.

Pigsy hides his shaking hands by clenching them into fists. “Bad batch,” He replies, succinct.

When he glances MK’s way, he imagines how easy it would be for him to repeat last night. Would it sound the same, the skull crunching in his grip quick, or would MK’s Monkey King powers offer enough resistance so that it’d be slow? 

Pigsy remembers his old name, his old title, his old desires. He would fight with Sun Wukong and enjoy it. He is powerful, then and now.

He promised himself he wouldn’t be that person again, that he’d be better. But looking back at that journey, is it any wonder that he’s so quickly fallen back into the same bad habits? Zhu Bajie was rude, cruel, a liar.

Why’d Pigsy expect that he could change?

“A shame.” 

He nearly jumps, at the sound of her voice, his voice. He glances at the blue rimmed glasses, brown eyes. Warm and cold.

“It looked delicious, at least,” Tang says, head resting on his palm. He smiles, soft.

Pigsy looks away.

He gets back to work.

Some of her jobs are simple. Break something, find an artifact. Pigsy learns not to ask questions, because none of the answers give him much comfort. Occasionally, Pigsy will get his hands messy, stained with the blood of demons. Those nights he barely sleeps, too busy trying to scrape the dried liquid from beneath his fingernails.

He justifies it, even though there is no true justification for the carnage. Thankfully, there haven’t been any more mortal deaths. The demons he fights are  _ bad _ , he thinks, as he watches them bleed out on the floor. The demons he fights would be going after MK if he didn’t get rid of them first. 

MK mentions offhandedly that there haven’t been as many demon fights recently. Pigsy horrifies himself with the sick satisfaction he feels, the pride that swells in his chest.

He’s able to justify his actions, but it doesn’t fix the gaping hole in his chest with every swing of his rake. The worst part, he thinks, is that it’s becoming easier to do. There’s a certain familiar numbness that comes with a higher and higher body count. He went through it thousands of years ago, when he first began fighting, and he goes through it now.

It settles in faster this time. Must be his experience.

He stays in the kitchen more often during the day. Ignores the banter between MK and Mei when they barrel in, only half hears the stories shared. He tries to lose himself in the motions of cooking, something that’s his, safe. He can still do this. So he’s fine.

She’s always there, either at the counter during the day or by his side at night. Pigsy makes a few valiant attempts to text someone, to tell them what’s happening, but she steals his phone and Pigsy isn’t allowed to touch it. She nearly cut off Tang’s finger when he attempted to take it back. He stops trying.

She follows him when he goes out, whether it be to the market or just on walks. No one raises an eyebrow at this—Pigsy has always stuck close to Tang, and vice versa. To the outside world, this is normal. She can tease and cloy and claw her way close to him and it’s just the silly antics everyone else expects. Any reaction Pigsy has is normal too, when he shouts and rages and pushes Tang away, because that’s just how he reacts. He’s loud and he’s mad.

He’s being played and he’s playing right into her clutches, but he doesn’t know what he can do.

Pigsy is so tired. Some days, he manages to convince himself that things will be fine, soon. He has to think it will be. If the demons were stronger than him, he thinks, maybe they’d deserve to live.

If they were stronger than him, maybe he’d get to stop.

Another development, one he can’t wrestle his feelings together on, is how Tang, how she, acts during their expeditions. There are lingering touches across his back, fingers trailing on his neck, a palm cupping his cheek. Sweet smiles thrown his way, gentle words whispered into his ear, arms curling around his form as he’s pressed against Tang’s body.

Every time he freezes, caught between revulsion and want, because he loves. Desperately.

That’s why he’s doing this after all. That’s why he even bothers. Sleepless nights, reopened wounds, returns to bad habits—it’s all for a man Pigsy cares just a little too much for.

She gets bolder with each passing night. Interlaces their fingers when he sets his hand on the counter during the day. Sends him compliments that make him weak in the knees. He knows that it’s not Tang, but sometimes he wonders. Maybe hopes. 

Because she’ll smile at him, but it'll be Tang’s smile, soft and almost a smirk but never quite there. He doesn’t know if that means Tang is still in there or if she’s just getting better at pretending to be him.

He doesn’t know which is worse.

It’s a little over a month later, one night after a job that leaves Pigsy’s hands bloody and his eyes weary, that he gives way, collapses in on himself. He grabs Tang’s scarf in shaky hands and trembles, because he’s so tired. He misses his best friend. He misses the person he’d do anything for, the person he’s doing the unspeakable for.

“Please,” he whispers, voice hoarse. “Take me-just-I’m stronger than him-I won’t fight back, you can do all the damage you want just—” he chokes on the words. “Give him back to me. You can have me, just give him  _ back.” _

He takes a shuddering breath, blinking away tears. They fall down his face anyway.

“Please.”

He trembles against Tang, something familiar made foreign because she’s stolen it from him, against something as silence fills the space.

Soft hands lift his chin and he hears a chuckle so familiar. He hates that doesn’t know who is laughing.

“Oh, Pigsy,” And it’s her, and it’s Tang, and Pigsy searches for understanding as a thumb brushes away his tears. She, Tang, leans down until their eyes are level.

Pigsy searches for something familiar in them. 

_ His favorite color is the color of Tang’s eyes, brown with a hint of red, soft and warm.  _

“Why would I need you, when you’re already giving yourself to me?”

And then Tang-she-his lips collide with Pigsy’s and-and-and—

Pigsy’s eyes are wide. This is-he’s wanted this for years, it’s everything, nothing, all at once.

He shouldn’t like this. This isn’t-it isn’t Tang. But Pigsy is pressed against the wall as Tang’s body leans forward, like everything Pigsy has ever wanted, and Pigsy closes his eyes. He closes his eyes and forgets, just for a moment, where he is and what’s happening, decides to be selfish.

When his eyes are closed, he can’t see anything. He can only feel Tang’s hands on the sides of his face, holding him so tenderly, Pigsy’s hands still bunched up in that scarf. He can’t see the glowing blue eyes, or the smirk, he can only feel the smile against his lips.

Tang pulls away first. Pigsy drops his hands and nearly trips over himself, eyes wide open again to blue eyes and a wide smile and a laugh that is cruel and knowing. 

“My, my, that sure was something! You really are desperate, aren’t you?” she says.

Pigsy wipes his mouth, trembling. He feels sick, not because he didn’t like it, but because he  _ did.  _ Does. 

“You-I—” he tries to explain himself, but she tuts and walks forward with a small smile on her face, patting him on the head like one would a dog.

“It’s alright, I understand. For a mortal, he is attractive.” She fiddles with Tang’s hair.

Pigsy wants to throw up. He wants to scream. He wants to throttle her, but he can’t hurt Tang. 

_ He might have already. _

How much does Tang see, does Tang feel? Did he see this, feel this? Did he watch Pigsy use him, like the monster he is, because Pigsy is selfish? The thoughts spiral deeper and deeper into something self destructive and Pigsy bites on his thumb hard enough to make it bleed.

“If it’s any consolation, he loves you too,” she says, and Pigsy freezes. “Do you think he never noticed how your hand would twitch toward his? You’re terribly obvious, but he’s a coward as well.”

Pigsy feels his breathing pick up.

Tang, he, he love-loved? Past tense, did Pigsy ruin it? Did he break something he never even had? Might not ever have, now?

A hand trails across his back and Pigsy shudders.

“No need to worry.” She leans in close, until Pigsy can feel her cool breath against his ear. “If you’re good, I think I can make this happen again.”

And then she walks away, leaving him in the wreckage. Pigsy breathes, clenches and unclenches his fists, fighting back the urge to cry because he doesn’t have the energy for more tears. He moves to leave, when—

“It seems you do have a bit of control left,” he hears, right before she’s out of earshot.

Everything goes cold.

What does that mean? Was the kiss...was that Tang? Or was it-what does that  _ mean? _

The more he thinks about it, the more his head goes through loops. Tang is in there. Tang has control-some, a bit, no specifics. Pigsy isn’t a thinker, he doesn’t know how possession works. Maybe-maybe Pigsy isn’t as terrible as he thinks he is. Maybe that means, maybe, it wasn’t all a lie?

His walk home takes ten minutes longer than it should. He keeps bringing up his fingers to his mouth, tracing the spaces where Tang’s lips slotted into, like a perfect puzzle. Every part of him she touched tingles like static, and Pigsy can’t think, can’t find a single thought. If it wasn’t Tang, if it was  _ just _ her...

He doesn’t know how to cope with the fact that he doesn’t want this. Not like this.

He doesn’t know how to cope with the fact that deep down, he  _ does _ . Regardless.

What kind of monster does that make him? 

Is it worse than the one he already is?

* * *

Tang is quiet when she kisses Pigsy. He doesn’t feel anything, touch long lost to his senses, floating in empty space. Some days, he doesn’t know where he ends and she begins but he knows that he has no weight to himself, not anymore.

He’s quiet, an ache in his chest growing ever painful as Pigsy gives in, and he wonders if it would have been like this if it were him. Something in the heat of the moment, passionate, real.

He wonders and grieves a life he isn’t having. She uses his mouth and whispers sickly sweet nothings and turns Pigsy around so that Tang isn’t sure that Pigsy knows what’s up and what’s down. She walks away and leaves Pigsy to try and collect himself, and all Tang wants to do is say sorry.

For what, he isn’t sure. This isn’t his doing. But that was him all the same. 

Tang bows his head and sniffles. He watches her wipe his eyes.

“It seems you do have a bit of control left,” she says, staring down at the tears in his palm. She flicks the water away. “Get over yourself. If you wanted this, you should have made it happen. You had plenty of time.”

And the worst part, Tang thinks, is that with the years he’s known Pigsy, he knows she’s right.

* * *

Pigsy tries to keep some semblance of normalcy after that, though it’s hard. He can feel Tang’s eyes on him, gaze lingering as Pigsy moves, day after day. He tries to keep his cheeks from flushing, tries from reacting at all, when Tang looks his way. He forces himself to remember that the kiss wasn’t right, wasn’t Tang.

But at the same time he can’t forget what he heard. What it could mean. Pigsy has mired himself in despair so deeply that the scrap of hope he feels is enough to keep him teetering on the edge of something dangerous, something selfish. 

There’s a change in the air between them, he knows. MK and Mei notice too, as much as he tries to keep this from them, keep them safe. He doesn’t want them trapped, like he is. He couldn’t handle it if they were.

“You guys have been acting weird.” Mei hops up to the counter as she speaks, glancing between Tang and Pigsy with squinted eyes.

“Oh?” Tang asks, leaning his head on his hand.

_ Not Tang. _

“Yeah, you guys have been real clingy,” MK slings an arm around Mei’s shoulders, rubbing his chin with his hand. 

Mei brightens.

“You guys have finally gotten together, haven’t you!” She points an accusatory finger at the both of them.

Pigsy freezes. Flushes from his feet all the way up to the tips of his ears, and Tang laughs, a soft, sweet, bell of a laugh.

“Were we that obvious?” Tang chuckles into his sleeve.

Mei bounces in her seat, and MK looks away, a little flustered himself at the idea.

“Uh, totally! We, uh, we  _ both _ saw this coming. Yeah.” Pigsy would laugh at MK’s poor attempt at a lie if he wasn’t frozen in place, stuck between horror and something else he can’t acknowledge.

Some part of him wants to pretend this is real. Some part of him, growing with every passing second, wants to play along until he forgets it’s a game. Because he’s been fed emptiness and sadness and helplessness and, suddenly, there’s this hope—maybe false, maybe real, dangling in front of him. 

There’s something good, and something kind, and something Pigsy needs. Something so cold it becomes warm and Pigsy would like to be warm.

“How’d it happen! I want details!” Mei leans forward, face a few inches away from Tang’s, and Pigsy fights the urge to pull her away from him. He doesn’t know if it’s because he wants to keep  _ her _ safe or  _ him. _

Tang goes into a story, dipping into the tone he would with Monkey King tales, and Pigsy feels the edges of static crawling up his neck, a high pitched tone drowning out the noise of conversation as he tries to make sense of the situation he’s in.

How did he even get to this point? He traces back memory after memory, but nothing makes sense. The pieces don’t fall into place, even as he finds each and every one to try and put it all together. It’s like someone has sanded the edges down, or covered them in ice, so they slip and scrape against each other. Pigsy stands still, and slowly swivels his head to glance at his family, Mei and MK and Tang, all situated at his counter, like they’ve always belonged.

He keeps reminding himself that it isn’t Tang, not really. But is it so terrible to pretend? When he’s already worse than he’s ever been?

“It was really special. Right, Pigsy?” Tang turns to him with an expectant grin, and Pigsy flushes again, a color Tang once told him was a dusty rose. 

He doesn’t snap. He bends, because when you bend, the cracks are slow to break. And Pigsy has always taken things slow, hasn’t he?

“Right.” He steps forward, his hand beneath Tang’s chin. Tang has always been the most handsome person Pigsy has ever seen, and how could that change, even with blue rims?

Tang’s lips brush against the side of his face, for the effect of MK and Mei’s groans, and Pigsy smiles.

* * *

Tang trusts Pigsy with his life

That goes without saying. As he forgets what it feels like to move his fingers, as he forgets what taste is, he knows above all else that he can trust Pigsy with his life. 

After all, Pigsy is why he’s alive at all. Anyone else would have buckled under the pressure by now, being the slave of the Baigujing. Anyone else would have made a mistake that would have left Tang a bleeding corpse on the ground.

Pigsy shoulders on, regardless of everything, because he values Tang’s life above all else. Tang knows this. That’s why he trusts Pigsy.

But things are changing, just a little. Pigsy’s desperation for something real, for Tang as he’s meant to be, is dying. Somehow, she’s bewitched the love of his life into something that is becoming unrecognizable. And Tang, though he is losing the memory of touch, of taste, of movement, finds this somehow more terrifying, more horrifying. 

To see Pigsy vanish, just as Tang did, with no one making him disappear but himself.

Pigsy leans into her false touches. He melts into the kisses she forces upon him. His resistance falls slow and Tang can do nothing but watch and wonder quietly, as numbness threatens to swallow him whole.

He trusts Pigsy with his life.

But he doesn’t know which life Pigsy is trying to save.

* * *

It keeps happening.

At night, when he gets moments of clarity, when he remembers how awful everything is, Tang will be there with honeyed words and precious touches to sweep Pigsy off of his feet and forget. Pigsy will be horrified by the sight of death in one moment and locked in an embrace in the next, kissed with a passion he can’t help but return.

“You’re so strong,” Tang will say, with reverence to his tone. “It’s incredible.”

Not Tang.

Pigsy will fight against the pride that comes from the compliment, then fail every time to stifle it. Because he is strong, incredibly so, and he is powerful, and he can swipe through any demon with ease.

_ Nevermind the brothers, crying out for each other when he’d separated them, the way one had gone pale and quiet when the other went still, because they were a pair made one. You can’t kill a pair at the same time, unfortunately. _

Pigsy knows he should feel guilty, should fight more. Knows that this isn’t right, it isn’t real. It’s so easy to forget, though, so easy to cling to something good when everything else hurts.

It’s so easy to set aside the memories of how wrong it all is. So easy to hide it all away, focus on the elation, the kind smiles, the gentle touches. Tang washes blood off of Pigsy’s hands when they get home— _ it’s their home, how could he forget _ —and curls up with Pigsy in the night, holding him close, and Pigsy clings, because he needs this. Needs something that makes him feel like things are okay.

The thoughts reminding him that this isn’t Tang start to slip through Pigsy’s fingers. He finds himself relaxing around the shop, smiling when he sees Tang at his seat, squeezing back when Tang interlocks their fingers.

Why fight it? Sometimes it hurts, and god does it, but there’s something so lovely about it now, everything he ever wanted with a price he’s fine paying.

_ When you take a pig out of its domestic environment, it easily turns wild. Hair, tusks, a penchant for violence. And Pigsy hasn’t been out of his domestic environment in years, but he’s a pig, in the end, lost in the wilderness of an icy forest and blue eyes. _

“Hey, Pigsy?” MK’s voice comes from behind him.

Pigsy turns from his work to see his boy at the counter, wiping it down as he waits for orders to come in.

“What?” He glances between the pot and MK, deciding the pot will be fine for a few seconds.

“Are you doing okay? You, uh, you’ve been kind of quiet,” MK rubs the back of his neck, awkwardly.

Pigsy opens his mouth and closes it. He glances to the empty seat. Tang’s empty seat.

He doesn’t actually know where Tang has gone, but it’s so rare for it to happen. Pigsy tries to remember the last time Tang wasn’t in his spot during the day, but tracing memories that far back is like poking at the wreckage of a shattered pot; you’re bound to draw blood.

The tiny vestiges of resistance crawl from ash and leave burning fingerprints on the forefront of his mind.

_ Tell him _ , he hears himself think.  _ Tell him! This is your chance! _

But the truth is so, so painful, and Pigsy doesn’t have it in himself to shatter this equilibrium. Isn’t it so much kinder to let it settle beneath the surface, to hide the pain and make it so no one knows at all? He doesn’t want MK to look at him with horror and disgust. He doesn’t want to have to try to fix something that might be broken beyond repair.

This is nice. This is okay. He’s happy like this. Why ruin it?

He reaches over and ruffles MK’s hair. MK playfully smacks his hands away, and Pigsy chuckles.

“It’s  _ my _ job to worry about  _ you, _ kid,” he tells him. “I’m fine. Orders will be out in a minute.”

He waves MK off, and goes back to cooking.

Tang appears a minute later, in his seat.

“Hey,” Pigsy hears, and he turns, leaning on the little divider between the kitchen and the dining area.

“Hey, yourself,” he replies, and Tang smiles and kisses him soundly. Pigsy’s brain short circuits.

“What was that for?” He asks, something like incredulous elation in his voice as he laughs.

Tang’s face screams victory. Pigsy wonders what he’s won.

“Oh, I just felt like it.”

* * *

He supposes he has his answer.

* * *

He’s finishing up another job at the end of the month when Tang claps his hands together.

“Well, I think that’s it,” he says and Pigsy freezes, realizing what may come. “I don’t really have any other errands to run, and you’ve done your end of the bargain. I’ll be out by morning.”

No, Tang can’t go, he can’t. If Tang leaves, then what will Pigsy be? He needs this. Tang, Tang’s good for him.

He whirls around, and a hand reaches over to rest on Tang’s shoulder. Tang. Tang is good.

“I-wait-but,” Pigsy finds it so hard to articulate his thoughts nowadays.

He’s always been the muscle, Tang is the smart one. Pigsy is good at doing, not talking. He shouldn’t speak when everything comes out scrambled anyway.

“Use your words, now, dear,” Tang says, and Pigsy melts, like he always does. How can he not, when Tang is looking at him like that? Like Pigsy is his?

“I want to-you can stay-can you? I need you to stay. Please?”

Because Tang makes Pigsy feel whole, makes Pigsy feel loved. He can do whatever Tang wants him to do, whatever Tang needs, Pigsy will make it happen.

Tang’s fingers trail down Pigsy’s face. Pigsy leans into the touch, even though Tang’s fingers are cold. Tang feels cold, but that’s okay. Pigsy doesn’t mind.

“Oh, Pigsy,” and it’s Tang. Pigsy searches for understanding, as a thumb brushes away his fears, soft. Tang leans down until their eyes are level. Pigsy finds familiarity in them, like he’s known them for an eternity.

_ His favorite color is the color of Tang’s eyes, blue with a hint of white, hard and cold.  _

“All you had to do is ask,” Tang leans forward, and his lips brush against Pigsy’s, and Pigsy leans in.

It’s everything he’s ever wanted.

* * *

_ When ice touches the ocean, there is no crash. The ocean fights back against the shift in form at first, but eventually is quieted by the power ice wields. The ice smothers, the ice settles on top as a slate, and the sea goes still, everything hidden beneath, never to reach the surface. _

Tang watches, from the prison in his mind, and the cuffs on his wrists are so much tighter. He can't feel where the cuffs end and his arms begin. He can’t feel his hands. He can’t feel anything. All he has left is his vision, which is more a cruelty than a blessing.

_ When ice meets the earth it fills in the crevices left by time and expands, cracking stones apart and leaving it crumbling in its wake. _

Tang curls in on himself as she shows him a kiss he never got to give, as Pigsy leans in with no hesitation, lost in something Tang can’t save him from. He curls away from the sight and tries to pretend that things can get better, that they can be saved, but he doesn’t know. Not when it hurts this much. Not when he’s lost this much.

Something like betrayal rests bitterly in his stomach. Pigsy left him. For an imitation, Pigsy left him, and Tang knows there’s more there, knows there has to be, has seen it unravel, but it doesn’t change the fact. 

Pigsy made his choice, and Tang is the one suffering the consequences.

Tang crumbles quietly. He doesn’t even know, here, if he has eyes to cry from. It feels like he’s crying.

It feels like he’s screaming. No one hears. Even him.

_ If the water is still, it does not crash against the earth. There is no tide, and the earth remains unchanging. Except, even without the waves, time erodes it all. _

Tang has nothing but himself and time.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I'm way too proud of this. Maybe I'll make a fix it fic later


End file.
